Are Labour including affiliate members in the 5,000?

HOW MANY MEMBERS does the Labour Party have in its centenary year? According to the veteran political journalist, Richard Harman, the answer is – not a lot.

Writing in his “Politik” blog on Monday, 23 May, Harman noted:

“Politik has learned that the party’s membership is now probably below that of the Greens, which would place it below 5000, possibly less than half that.”

If true, that is shocking news – and it’s only fair to point out that within 24 hours the Labour Party’s new General Secretary, Andrew Kirton, was assuring Harman that it was not true. “We are far, far higher than 5,000 and therefore well above the Greens.”

In spite of reassuring his readers that the contested information came from “a usually reliable source”, Harman was willing – as of Tuesday morning – to take Kirton at his word.

A more cynical person, upon being told by Labour’s General Secretary that the membership figure is “far, far higher than 5,000”, might offer, by way of response, the words of the infamous call-girl, Mandy Rice-Davies, who, when told that an Establishment big-wig had denied all knowledge of her, shot back the immortal line: “Well, he would say that, wouldn’t he?”

Certainly, it would be remarkable if a political party with fewer than 5,000 members entertained any serious hopes of becoming the Government.

I suspect the number of individual members is below 5,000. Labour often muddies the water by including affiliate members as members. But they are not the same thing.

An individual member of a political party is one who every year makes a decision to pay a membership fee to that party. It is a proactive ongoing decision.

Labour’s affiliate members are very different. How they work is like this. Let’s say Union X in 2002 voted to affiliate to Labour. And that 60% of the union members who bothered to vote voted in favour. That union may have 10,000 members yet just 500 may have voted on the decision to affiliate.

Anyway as 60% voted in favour, then 60% of the unions’s members are determined to always be an affiliate member of Labour. So if that union in 2016 has 13,000 then they are deemed to have 7,800 affiliate members. That is despite the fact not a single member of their union pays a sub to Labour (the union just does a block payment at a very low rate).

So if you ever see Labour claim to have X members, ask them how many individual members they have.

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Comments (16)

Huevon

A useful proxy would be to work out the number of people who work full time in the union movement. There is basically an obligation on these people to be active in the party. Probably 300 to 400 tops. Then add the number of students in the youth branches at the universities (maybe another 200). Then add in the odd blow in from the general public (stab in the dark – no more than 1,000 unfortunate souls). Then add the retired MPs (not too many of those) or past MPs who lost seats (maybe 50 odd). Add it up…i would be surprised if there numbers topped 2,000 but just an educated guess.

AgentBallSack

Come on Chris, we are waiting for your evisceration of Labours decision to join with the toxic Greens. We already know Labour are stony broke and no one wants to be part of their mailing list or even worse donate to a bunch of no hoper unionists.

dubya

I think most people join political parties quite young. Older people simply don’t have time.

Right now, if you’re young and studying sociology, it’s cool to join the Greens. You can surround yourself with likeminded middle-class guilt affected females (and men with weak upper bodies) and talk about climate change, Maui dolphins and the saintly poor.

If you’re a commerce student who went to Grammar and like to talk about investment property, cricket, and the feckless poor, you join the Young Nats.

But Young Labour – WTF does that even stand for? Cloth capped unionism has been overtaken by dreadlocked social justice.

AgentBallSack

David Garrett

Note the careful wording of the denial.. “far far higher than that…” Not: “In excess of 10/20/30,000 members”…even the first would be true if there were 10,001 members…but carefully no number is given..whereas the Nats apparently have no problem claiming 25,000 members, and a goal to have 35,000…

Click on the link to Trotter’s blog…the comments there demonstrate beautifully why Labour is fucked…even their supporters are riven by factions! Great stuff…

greenjacket

“Then add the number of students in the youth branches at the universities (maybe another 200). ”
Having recently accidentally come across a meeting of the once mighty Labour Party branch at my old Alma Mater, I’d say that 200 members is an overestimate. (Recalling my university days from the 80s it was actually kind of sad seeing the once mighty Labour Party branch reduced to half a dozen people). In contrast, Greens-on-Campus seemed numerous and highly motivated.

AgentBallSack

Okay, I found it at The Daily Blog. He is not happy.

Key passages include:

For months now there has been much discussion “inside the beltway” of Labour’s deep-seated financial difficulties. The slightest suggestion that a person might harbour left-wing sympathies has been enough to earn them a deluge of begging e-mails from Andrew Little and other Labour politicians. People make a joke of it, but those who know something about political fundraising are only too aware that these are the tactics of desperation.

This is the kind of information that a political analyst draws upon when confronted with an event like yesterday’s announcement. And so, because I cannot pretend to be unaware of Labour’s difficulties, I will not characterise Labour’s decision to strengthen its relationship with the Greens as anything other than a desperate concession of organisational and electoral weakness. Indeed, were I a member of the Labour Caucus, I would be demanding to read the fine print of this new “Red-Green Alliance”.

And:

The skill with which the coming together of Labour and the Alliance was communicated to the electorate spoke volumes about the readiness of both parties for the rigors of office. The gimcrack quality of yesterday’s (31/5/16) announcement: a hastily cobbled together presser in the old Legislative Chamber; likewise had a story to tell.
It is the story of an exhausted and impecunious political organisation. A party stumbling towards its 100th anniversary in desperate need of support – any support. It is also the story of a younger and much more vital party desperate for its chance to exercise real power, and absolutely determined that it will not, once again, be robbed of its chance at the eleventh hour.
Such is my understanding of the Labour-Green “Understanding”.Those who think they’ve witnessed a marriage made in electoral heaven – should think again.